Category: War and Conflict

It looks like the war in Venezuela could begin as soon as next month, and it doesn’t appear that there will initially be much opposition to the conflict in the United States. There is widespread bipartisan support for “regime change” in Venezuela among both Democrats and Republicans, and the mainstream media is clearly willing to go along for the ride. Donald Trump is now surrounded by extremely hawkish advisers that are very eager to do something about Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, and if Trump decides to pull the trigger it is likely that the vast majority of his supporters will fully back the decision. And at this point most of the other major western nations are also calling for Maduro to go, but Maduro insists that he isn’t going anywhere. So a peaceful solution to this crisis appears to be out of the question, and that means that war is almost certainly coming.

This weekend was the first step. If western aid could be forced across the border, it would show that Maduro was losing control of the country. But if Maduro was able to block the aid that was coming across, that would make him look like a leader that doesn’t care about his people to those in the western world, and sympathetic media reports would help drum up support for war. Of course by now most of us have seen images of the violence that happened along the border over the weekend, and a lot of blood was needlessly shed. The following comes from Vox…

Starting Friday, violent clashes erupted at several points along Venezuela’s border with Colombia as armed government forces tried to block shipments of aid from entering the country. By the end of Saturday, at least four people had reportedly been killed along that line and along the Latin American country’s border with Brazil; hundreds more were injured. Maduro has insisted that the humanitarian supplies are unnecessary and spent the weekend continuing to celebrate his ongoing rule with his supporters — even as the United States and other international leaders amped up calls for him to step down.

CNN, MSNBC and Fox News are going to endlessly run footage of the violent clashes over the weekend, and this will build support for whatever action is ultimately taken.

During the Bush years, direct military action was the preferred model, and we saw this in Afghanistan and Iraq. During the Obama years, arming the “resistance” and starting civil wars was the preferred model, and we saw this in Syria and Ukraine.

So what will Trump ultimately decide to do?

Well, the Russians appear to believe that in this case the Obama model will be followed, and they are accusing the United States of making preparations to arm the opposition in Venezuela. According to Russian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Maria Zakharova, the U.S. has already transported special forces personnel and military equipment “closer to Venezuelan territory”…

Zakharova alleged that the US had moved special forces and military equipment ‘closer to Venezuelan territory’ and was considering large-scale weapons purchases to arm the opposition.

Noting that it had been five years since the Ukrainian revolution that ousted a Russian-backed leader – which Moscow has accused the US of orchestrating – Zakharova said Washington was preparing for more regime change in Venezuela.

‘It seems that in Washington there is nothing to mark the fifth anniversary of the coup d’etat in Ukraine, so they decided to hold a new coup d’etat,’ she said.

She also told the press that the U.S. is planning to transfer “a large batch of weapons and ammunition” from an Eastern European nation to those that are ready to fight against Maduro’s government in Venezuela…

“We have evidence that US companies and their NATO allies are working on the issue of acquiring a large batch of weapons and ammunition in an Eastern European country for their subsequent transfer to Venezuelan opposition forces”, she said during the briefing.

If these allegations are true, the United States is about to turn Venezuela into a horrific war zone.

And Zakharova went on to say that “the cargo” is scheduled to arrive in Venezuela “in early March”…

“The cargo is set to arrive in Venezuela in early March through a neighboring country on aircraft flown by an international shipping company,” she said.

Could it be possible that everything that the Russians are saying is untrue?

Sure.

But when they publicly call us out on something like this, they usually have their ducks in a row. And if these allegations are true and the Russians were able to acquire this information somehow, this represents a stunning security failure for the U.S. military.

Of course a civil war is quite unlikely to be successful in overthrowing Maduro, and it is still possible that President Trump may opt for direct action by the U.S. military.

In fact, it appears that Venezuela’s self-declared “acting president” Juan Guaido could be on the verge of formally asking the U.S. military for help in “the liberation of our homeland”…

The threat comes just Guaido announced he would attend a summit of the Lima Group – a meeting of 12 American states which have recognized him as “legitimate” leader of Venezuela.

Crucially, Guaido is to meet with US Vice President Mike Pence at the summit where he will “propose formally to the international community that we should keep open all options for the liberation of our homeland, which is fighting and will continue to fight,” according to a tweeted statement Saturday evening.

If Guaido does officially request U.S. military intervention, it will only be because the U.S. has already assured him that he will get it.

In recent days, President Trump has repeatedly stated that all options are “open” when it comes to Venezuela, and U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo stressed the same thing during an interview with Fox News on Sunday…

It appears this weekend’s provocations and border showdown over US aid entering Venezuela were just the beginning. US State Secretary Mike Pompeo discussed the prospect of military action against Caracas on Fox News Sunday, saying the Maduro regime’s days are “numbered” and that “every option” is on the table toward making that happen.

Pompeo said the US is “going to do the things that need to be done” and this will not stop until “makes sure” that “there is a brighter future for the people of Venezuela,” which includes continued support for self-proclaimed interim president, Juan Guaido.

There are a few voices on the right and a few voices on the left that are speaking out against war in Venezuela, but right now the overwhelming consensus in Washington is that regime change is necessary.

Needless to say, whenever there is an overwhelming consensus on something in Washington, it is usually a really, really bad idea.

My regular readers already know that I believe that the U.S. should not be “the police of the world”, and that if we are going to ask young American men and women to die it should be for a very, very good reason.

Replacing one socialist leader in Venezuela with a slightly less socialist leader does not qualify.

Steve Quayle has noticed all of the war talk as well, and in his most recent alert he called these “very dangerous times”…

MANY DIFFERENT AREA’S IN THE WORLD SEEM TO HAVE BEEN KICKED INTO WAR MODE, AT THE FLIP OF THE GLOBALIST SWITCH-KEEP YOUR EYES ON THE ESCALATION BETWEEN PAKISTAN AND INDIA, AS WELL AS RUSSIA VERSUS THE UKRAINE. BACKROOM TALK OF CUBA BEING PUT ON WAR FOOTING ALSO. PRESIDENT PUTINS ANGER, IS OFF THE CHARTS AND THE WEST IS ABOUT TO INITIATE A SERIE OF EVENTS THAT WILL ESCALATE RAPIDLY-USE TOMORROW TO TOP OFF PREPS JUST IN CASE! RUN THROUGH YOUR LISTS TONIGHT -GOOD TIME TO RUN THROUGH YOUR CHECKLIST-AND CHRISTIANS PRAY AND INTERCEDE WITH YOUR WHOLE HEART-VERY DANGEROUS TIMES

I have written this article with a very heavy heart. I have a really bad feeling about what is going to happen, and I wish that I could do something to stop it.

Peace is being taken from the Earth, and what is coming next is going to shock all of us.

Is the United States about to be dragged into another pointless war that will drag on for years? Have we learned nothing form the wars in Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq? When Juan Guaido boldly declared himself the new leader of Venezuela during an opposition rally on January 23rd, everybody realized that something was up. There is no way that he ever would have done that unless he knew in advance that the United States was going to publicly back him. And when John Bolton appeared at a White House briefing with “5,000 troops to Colombia” scribbled on a yellow note pad, it became exceedingly clear what was about to happen. Diplomatic pressure would be used to try to force Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro from power, but if that didn’t work then regime change would be achieved by force.

Maduro has seen this playbook before, and he has told the Venezuelan people that if “the North American empire attacks us, we will have to defend ourselves”. He is officially freaked out, and for good reason.

The push toward war is officially on, and over the weekend Donald Trump told CBS reporter Margaret Brennan that sending U.S. troops to Venezuela is “an option” that is being considered…

MARGARET BRENNAN: What would make you use the U.S. military in Venezuela? What’s the national security interest?

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, I don’t want to say that. But certainly it’s something that’s on the – it’s an option.

Yes, Nicolas Maduro is an absolutely horrible leader, but do we get to overthrow the governments of other countries just because we don’t like who is in charge?

And how would you feel if somebody else decided to attack us because they don’t like who is in the White House?

The U.S. was the first major power to recognize Juan Guaido as the “legitimate” president of Venezuela, and now the UK and most other European nations have also backed Guaido.

But Russia and China continue to back Maduro, and so that sets up a very interesting situation.

Will the western powers go ahead with their plans for regime change even though the international community is divided?

In particular, Russia has a very strong incentive to keep Maduro in power. The following comes from Zero Hedge…

“Russia is now so deeply invested in the Maduro regime that the only realistic option is to double down,” writes senior fellow at the Carnegie Moscow Center Alexander Gabuev.

He details in a Financial Times op-ed that Moscow-based state oil giant Rosneft owns two offshore gas fields in Venezuela and further has “stakes in assets boasting more than 20m tonnes of crude.” But as embattled President Nicolas Maduro faces US-led efforts to oust him in favor of opposition leader Juan Guaido, billions are on the line for Moscow making its interest in preserving the regime run deep.

So just like in Syria and Ukraine, the U.S. and Russia once again find themselves on opposite sides in a very tense conflict.

This crisis could end very quickly if Maduro steps down, but that isn’t going to happen. In fact, he was quite defiant when the major European powers decided to recognize Guaido…

He also rejected European calls for elections, saying: “We don’t accept ultimatums from anyone. I refuse to call for elections now – there will be elections in 2024. We don’t care what Europe says.”

“Stop. Stop, Trump! Hold it right there! You are making mistakes that will leave your hands covered in blood and you will leave the presidency stained with blood,” Maduro warned during a combative interview with the Spanish journalist Jordi Évole. “Why would you want a repeat of Vietnam?”

That certainly doesn’t sound like someone that intends to throw in the towel. Maduro has the Venezuelan military and the Venezuelan police solidly behind him, and former State Department official Eric Farnsworth thinks that it is unlikely that Maduro will leave without violence…

“If people are not prepared to take steps designed to support the nascent Guaido government, this could flop and that would be a huge setback,” Farnsworth said. “Does that mean the ultimate answer is U.S. troops? I don’t think that’s a healthy conversation to have. If Maduro wants to have U.S. troops at his doorstep, he’ll start targeting U.S. citizens.”

Farnsworth said the only scenario where Maduro is pressured to leave without violence involves Russia and China becoming convinced that Maduro’s potential successor would be better for them than the status quo and working with the international community on a transition plan. Russia and China continue to recognize Maduro, and Russia has sent aircraft to Venezuela amid reports that Maduro is looking to remove gold reserves from the country.

If the U.S. wants Guaido to be successful, he is going to need military help, and that would mean a full-blown invasion of Venezuela.

A full-blown invasion of Venezuela would be an ugly, bloody war. Without a doubt, the U.S. would ultimately win, but global opinion would turn against us very rapidly just like it did during the wars in Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq.

We always knew that this was coming. We always knew that there would eventually be a war between Israel and Iran, but we had hoped that it could be put off for as long as possible. Well, now it appears that time may have run out. The exchange of missiles between the IDF and Iranian forces based in Syria on Sunday represented a major escalation of a conflict that has been simmering at a low level for months. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is pledging to continue to “strike at the Iranian entrenchment in Syria”, and on the other side the Iranians and the Syrians have changed the rules of the engagement to allow for a military response against Israel every time Israel strikes targets inside Syria. What this means is that there are going to be more missiles going back and forth, and it seems inevitable that both sides will eventually cross the point of no return.

And even now, we may be dangerously close to that line. In the aftermath of the missile exchange on Sunday, the Israeli Minister of Intelligence declared that Israel is now in “an open confrontation with Iran”…

Yisrael Katz, Israel’s Minister of Intelligence, later told Galatz that the policy for taking on Iran in Syria had changed and that the Jewish state was now in “open confrontation” with Iran.

“This is an open confrontation with Iran. When we need to step it up, we’ll step it up,” Katz said while again adding that Israel would not allow the continuing Iranian entrenchment in Syria.

Syria’s United Nations envoy called on the world body’s Security Council to take measures against Israel’s continued assault on Syrian territories, as reported by the Syrian news agency Sana, wondering whether it would take a Syrian attack on Tel Aviv Airport to draw the council’s attention.

“Does drawing the attention of the war-makers in this Council require us to exercise our legitimate right to self-defense and respond to Israeli aggression on Damascus International Airport by responding in the same way on Tel Aviv Airport?” the Syrian envoy, Dr. Bashar Al-Ja’afari, asked.

If Ben Gurion gets hit, we will immediately see fireworks in the Middle East like we haven’t seen in decades.

The head of Iran’s air force said on Monday the country was ready to fight Israel and destroy it.

Speaking to the Young Journalist Club, a website supervised by state television, Brigadier General Aziz Nasirzadeh said: “The young people in the air force are fully ready and impatient to confront the Zionist regime and eliminate it from the Earth.”

The Iranians fully mean what they are saying. They absolutely hate Israel with a passion and they will not stop until it no longer exists.

Brig. Gen. Mohammad Reza Naqdi, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Deputy Commander for Cultural and Social Affairs, said in a December 28 interview with the Iraqi television network Al-Nujaba that the “Islamic revolution in Iran will not back down” from the goal of “wiping out” the Jewish state.

And he went on to add that he plans to personally raise a flag over the city of Jerusalem once they conquer it…

He vowed to take part in that effort. “We were, we are, and we will continue to be the soldiers of Imam Khamenei,” he said, “until our last breath and until the last drop of our blood. I myself will hoist the flag of the Islamic Revolution in Jerusalem, Allah willing.”

Are you starting to understand why war between Israel and Iran is inevitable?

Iran is run by a bunch of nutjobs that all believe that they have a religious duty to wipe Israel off the face of the planet. They think about this every day when they wake up, and they are still thinking about it every day when they go to sleep.

And if Israel and Iran go to war, guess who else will almost certainly enter the conflict?

President Trump has pledged to do whatever it takes to defend the nation of Israel, and it was recently revealed that at one point the White House actually asked the Pentagon to draw up a plan for bombing Iran.

Of course the Russians are already allied with Iran and their forces are already in Syria, and so they could easily be dragged into the conflict on the other side.

What we are talking about is an apocalyptic scenario which could easily lead to the outbreak of World War 3.

But we have gotten this far without a major regional war erupting in the Middle East, and hopefully cooler heads will prevail and things will calm down in the days ahead.

Because war is truly a horrible thing, and nobody should want to see a conflict erupt in which millions of people could potentially die.

A respected foreign journalist living in Ukraine is warning that a war that most Americans cannot even imagine “teeters on the razor thin edge of becoming real”. When Russia opened fire on Ukrainian Navy vessels and captured three of their ships, it made headlines all over the globe. An emergency meeting of the UN Security Council was hastily arranged for Monday at 11 AM, and hopefully there will be a positive outcome from that meeting. Because right now Moscow and Kiev are on the brink of war, and once a Russian invasion happens there will be no turning back. At that point the U.S. would have a major decision to make, and if we chose to defend Ukraine that could mean that we would suddenly find ourselves fighting World War 3.

Most people don’t realize that this crisis has been simmering for over a week. The following is from a U.S. News & World Report article that was posted on November 19th…

A dispute over shipping lanes is threatening to reignite the 4-year-old simmering war between Ukraine and Russia following confrontations sparked by both sides in recent days.

Russian border guards on Monday detained Ukrainian fishing vessels in the Sea of Azov, a strategically important body of water contained to the north by Ukraine, to the west by the Crimean Peninsula and to the east and south by Russia. Monday’s incident came days after Russian President Vladimir Putin slammed Kiev for detaining Russian commercial ships also in the Azov in what he described as “a totally illegal move” and which Kremlin officials have warned may prompt retaliation.

When you realize what has already taken place, it puts the most recent events in an entirely different context.

The Russians blocked the Kerch Strait in retaliation for having had their own commercial vessels detained by the Ukrainian government.

And when the Ukrainians decided to test the Russians by sailing Ukrainian Navy vessels into the Kerch Strait, the Russians decided not to back down. The following comes from Sky News…

Russia has opened fire on Ukrainian ships and captured three vessels in a major escalation of tensions off the coast of Crimea.

Three sailors have been wounded after the Ukrainian navy said two artillery boats were hit by the strikes in the Black Sea.

Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko called an emergency session of his war cabinet and said he will propose that parliament declare martial law.

So the truth is that neither side is exactly “innocent” in this situation.

The Kerch Strait is absolutely critical, because it is the only way into and out of the Azov Sea…

The strait connects the Azov Sea with the Black Sea and runs between the Crimean Peninsula and Russia. It’s a shallow, narrow stretch of water just two to three miles (3.2 to 4.8 kilometers) wide at one point near the Chuska landspit.

The strait is an important economic lifeline for Ukraine, as it allows ships leaving the port city of Mariupol to access the Black Sea.

It’s also the the closest point of access for Russia to Crimea, a peninsula Moscow annexed in 2014. The international community has largely not recognized Russia’s annexation of Crimea, but that did not stop Russia from building a bridge over the Kerch Strait connecting Crimea to mainland Russia. The Kerch Strait bridge was opened in May.

In addition to asking for a declaration of martial law, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has also been gathering with his top military leaders. Poroshenko is pledging that Ukraine will not take any “offensive” military actions, but he also says that they are ready to defend against any attacks from Russia.

The Russians are accusing Poroshenko of manipulating this crisis in order to pump up his flagging approval ratings for the upcoming presidential elections. There is a very real possibility that Poroshenko could lose, and he is desperate to stay in office.

Of course the Ukrainians are blaming Russia for everything, and Poroshenko says that what happened on Sunday “was an act of war”…

Finally, Ukraine has called for an urgent UN Security Council meeting over ‘Russian aggression’ while Ukraine’s secretary for national security, Oleksander Turchynov, accused Russia of engaging in an act of war: “We heard reports on incident and have concluded that it was an act of war by Russian Federation against Ukraine”.

At this point, it is unclear what the Russians will do next.

Hopefully they will see that a full-blown invasion of Ukraine would not be wise.

But if they decide that such a war is inevitable, they will move with lightning speed as we have seen in other conflicts. For example, Russia had already annexed Crimea before the rest of the world even started talking about it. And we all remember what happened in Georgia.

If and when Russia finally pulls the trigger, their forces will be halfway to Kiev before the mainstream media in the western world even realizes what is happening.

And if Russia does invade, the Trump administration will be under tremendous pressure from Republicans, Democrats and other NATO members to intervene. Already, there has been some very tough talk from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo…

It’s yet unclear how far the U.S. is willing to go in support for Ukraine. In a joint statement after Klimkin’s meeting with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo last week, both sides “condemned Russia’s aggressive actions against international shipping transiting the Black Sea, the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait to Ukrainian ports” and agreed that “Russia’s aggressive activities in the Sea of Azov have brought new security, economic, social, and environmental threats to the entire Azov-Black Sea region.”

But if we directly intervene in a military conflict between Russia and Ukraine, that could very easily trigger World War 3.

Most Americans are not concerned that a conflict between Russia and Ukraine could potentially affect the United States, but the threat is very real. In fact, according to foreign correspondent Nolan Peterson such a war “teeters on the razor thin edge of becoming real”…

This is the most dangerous moment I’ve seen in Ukraine in years. Tonight, a war that many people in America can only imagine thanks to Hollywood movies, teeters on the razor thin edge of becoming real. Tonight in Ukraine we go to sleep not knowing what tomorrow will bring.

Let us hope for peace, because right now the world is becoming a more chaotic place with each passing day…

Screenshot via Youtube / Mike BivinsPaul Welch is not a fascist. He is a liberal who voted for Bernie Sanders in the 2016 Democratic primary, and for Hillary Clinton in the general election. On August 4, he attended a far-right rally in Portland, Oregon, as a counterdemonstrator intent on signaling his opposition to the “tacitly fascist event,” he toldThe Oregonian.

Tell that to Antifa: One of the masked militants attacked Welch, striking him over and over again with some kind of metal rod concealed in black cloth. One blow landed on his head, which caused Welch to immediately crumple to the ground. He would eventually need four staples to close up the gaping wound.

How did Antifa misidentify Welch? He had brought an American flag with him in an attempt to take the symbol back from Patriot Prayer, the group holding the rally. According to The Oregonian:

“The right and certainly a lot of smaller groups like Patriot Prayer might rush to things like the flag and try to take it up as, ‘This is our symbol exclusively,'” [Welch] said. “Part of my thinking was to take it back.”

Aside from a few odd looks, Welch did not encounter any problems when he joined hundreds of other counter-protesters who gathered at City Hall late that morning.

In fact, Welch said, he saw several other people with American flags sprinkled among the group of progressives, union members and social justice activists.

But then, two members of Antifa confronted him and demanded he hand over the flag, which they characterized as a “fascist symbol.” When Welch resisted, they attacked him. The concussion landed him in the hospital for two days.

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It was, of course, wrong to attack Welch regardless of his political views. Even if Welch had been a Trump-worshipping alt-right troll, the masked man still had no right to try to take Welch’s flag and club him over the head when he resisted. This was an ill-founded and immoral initiation of violence, full stop.

But it’s also a good reminder of why Antifa’s resistance strategy, punch Nazis in the streets, wherever and whenever they appear, is deeply misguided. Not everybody who attends a protest is a Nazi. Not everyone who waves an American flag is a fascist. Not every Republican is racist (Queer Eye‘s Jonathan Van Ness is right). A group that endorses political violence while claiming that everyone who isn’t with them is against them, and that centrists are essentially fascist collaborators, is not a group that is making careful distinctions or thoughtfully considering its tactical approach. A broad endorsement of violence as a resistance tactic is certain to result in innocent people getting hurt, and to turn the moderate masses away from whatever it is Antifa supposedly represents. As a general matter, civil resistance works and violent protests backfire.

It’s easy to abuse the whole “See, this is why Trump won!” thing. But beating the crap out of a liberal because he committed the sin of carrying an American flag does in fact seem like it belongs in the win-for-Trump column. If the left wants to defeat Trump, the worst thing it can do is make people fear Antifa more than they fear the administration.

Update: This post initially gave the wrong first name for Welch. I reget the error.

Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, speaking at a Ron Paul Institute conference this past weekend, predicted US troops would remain in Afghanistan another 50 years — just as they have in Germany and Korea. He also termed the ongoing US-backed campaign in Yemen the “most brutal war on earth,” a war western media overwhelming ignore.

Colonel Douglas Macgregor at the same conference called Washington DC “the place where good ideas go to die.” His years at the Pentagon, coupled with his experience leading US forces into Iraq during the first Gulf War, caused him to question the DC War Party in the most profound ways. Visiting the parents of an America soldier incinerated in a tank during that foray into Iraq, a foray with few US casualties otherwise, caused him to question not only his own missions but also the larger mission of US armed forces.

Both of these men now pose the same question: what is the goal? Why do seemingly endless military conflicts persist, despite lacking any constituency for their prosecution beyond the DC beltway? And why does US military strategy appear incoherent and counterproductive, when viewed through the lens of peace? Why can’t we do anything about this, no matter whom we elect and no matter how much war fatigue resides in the American public?

The answer is not found in a facile denunciation of the military industrial complex or war profiteers, though both are very serious problems. The answer lies in understanding how the DC War Party operates. Its goals are not ours. It is not democratic; the government is not “us.” It is not political; its architects are permanent fixtures who do not come and go with presidential administrations. It is not accountable; budgeting is nonexistent and gross failures only beget greater funding. It is above all not “economic” — it operates in an artificial “market,” one created and perpetuated by wars and interventions ordinary people don’t want. War socialism, or what former Congressman Barney Frank brilliantly termed “military Keynesianism,” has taken on a life of its own.

Ludwig von Mises saw peace as the key to any liberal economic program, and argued strenuously against the fallacy of war prosperity. Even early in his career, before his horrific experiences as an officer in the Austro-Hungarian Army during World War I, he recognized the critical distinction between economy and war: the former characterized by exchange and cooperation, the latter marked by the worst form of state intervention:

Only one thing can conquer war — that liberal attitude which can see nothing in war but destruction and annihilation, and which can never wish to bring about a war, because it regards war as injurious even to the victors.

For Mises, war was worse than zero-sum. Even the prevailing party suffers, just as the shopkeeper suffers in Bastiat’s “Parable of the Broken Window.” The glazier’s profit does not benefit society, just as the War Party’s success in breaking other countries does not. But the loss is not only economic, it is also cultural and moral. War, the ultimate rejection of reason as a means of navigating human society, reduces our capacity for compassion and makes us complacent about atrocities. Worst of all, it emboldens and strengthens the domestic state — encouraging us to accept absurdities like TSA theater and heavily militarized SWAT teams operating in peaceful small towns.

While US troops remain mired throughout the Middle East, a subsurface political war heats up in the US. This cold civil war creates the kind of hyper-politicized society progressives once only dreamed of. Social media outlets encourage even the most ill-informed and ill-intentioned voices to spread hatred against those with differing views. Goodwill doesn’t translate, so fake bravado hidden behind anonymity or distance are the order of the day. Epithets like “racist,” fascist,” “Nazi” and worse become cheap currency in the new vocabulary of meaningless words. Dissenting voices lose jobs, reputations, and access to popular platforms. Mobs form to attack political opponents in restaurants and shops, shout down campus events, and threaten online disclosure of their perceived enemies’ personal information.

Meanwhile overt socialists like Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Keith Ellison, and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez lead the Democratic Party to demand government health schemes, guaranteed incomes, and “people’s” ownership of corporations. The statist house organ known as the Washington Post calls for the word “socialism” to be “reclaimed” and viewed in positive terms. Ostensible conservatives like William Kristol, Max Boot, and Lindsey Graham follow suit and utterly divorce themselves from any notion of judicious government. They call for the destruction of Iran, escalation of tensions with nuclear-armed Russia, and belligerence toward China and North Korea. Donald Trump, despite some initial antiwar instincts, hunkers down with twitter while surrounding himself with rabidly interventionist advisers like John Bolton.

What can this environment yield other than a rapidly coarsening society and the increasing potential for outright war between nuclear nations?

Just as civilization cannot be divorced from civility in our personal comportment, economics cannot be divorced from war. The most important and immediate action we can take is to expose the gross economic fallacies of our day. The hawkishness of neoconservatives and the “democratic socialism” of progressives both lead in the same direction, toward economic destruction and war. If you think American society is polarized and prone to lashing out abroad now, what happens with a shrinking economy and 40% unemployment?

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One of the most insidious ways politicians expand government is by creating new programs to “solve” problems created by politicians. For example, government interference in health care increased health care costs, making it difficult or even impossible for many to obtain affordable, quality care. The effects of these prior interventions were used to justify Obamacare.

Now, the failures of Obamacare are being used to justify further government intervention in health care. This does not just include the renewed push for socialized medicine. It also includes supporting new laws mandating price transparency. The lack of transparency in health care pricing is a direct result of government policies encouraging overreliance on third-party payers.

This phenomenon is also observed in foreign policy. American military interventions result in blowback that is used to justify more military intervention. The result is an ever-expanding warfare state and curtailments on our liberty in the name of security.

Another example of this is related to the reaction to President Trump’s tariffs. Many of America’s leading trading partners have imposed “retaliatory” tariffs on US goods. Many of these tariffs target agriculture exports. These tariffs could be devastating for American farmers, since exports compose as much as 20 percent of the average farmer’s income.

President Trump has responded to the hardships imposed on farmers by these retaliatory tariffs with a 12 billion dollars farm bailout program. The program has three elements: direct payments to farmers, use of federal funds to buy surplus crops and distribute them to food banks and nutrition programs, and a new federal effort to promote American agriculture overseas.

This program will not fix the problems caused by Tramp’s tariffs. For one thing, the payments are unlikely to equal the money farmers will lose from this trade war. Also, government marketing programs benefit large agribusiness but do nothing to help small farmers. In fact, by giving another advantage to large agribusiness, the program may make it more difficult for small farmers to compete in the global marketplace.

Distributing surplus food to programs serving the needy may seem like a worthwhile use of government funds. However, the federal government has neither constitutional nor moral authority to use money taken by force from taxpayers for charitable purposes. Government-funded welfare programs also crowd out much more effective and compassionate private efforts. Of course, if government regulations such as the minimum wage and occupational licensing did not destroy job opportunities, government farm programs did not increase food prices, and the Federal Reserve’s inflationary policies did not continuously erode purchasing power, the demand for food aid would be much less. By increasing spending and debt, the agriculture bailout will do much more to create poverty than to help the needy.

Agriculture is hardly the only industry suffering from the new trade war. Industries — such as automobile manufacturing — that depend on imports for affordable materials are suffering along with American exporters. AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka (who supports tariffs) has called for bailouts of industries negatively impacted by tariffs. He is likely to be joined in his advocacy by crony capitalists seeking another government handout.

More bailouts will only add to the trade war’s economic damage by increasing government spending and hastening the welfare–warfare state’s collapse and the rejection of the dollar’s world reserve currency status. Instead of trying to fix tariffs-caused damage through more corporate welfare, President Trump and Congress should pursue a policy of free markets and free trade for all and bailouts for none.

The Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity is a project of Dr. Paul’s Foundation for Rational Economics and Education (F.R.E.E.), founded in the 1970s as an educational organization. The Institute continues and expands Dr. Paul’s lifetime of public advocacy for a peaceful foreign policy and the protection of civil liberties at home. The Institute mobilizes colleagues and collaborators of Dr. Paul’s to participate in a broad coalition to educate and advocate for fundamental changes in our foreign and domestic policy.

The mainstream media and out-of-touch politicians and bureaucrats want us to believe that the Cold War never ended, it’s a crime to talk with a Russian, and we should all be fearful of any Russians here in the U.S. Apparently our $21 trillion national debt, lack of border security, and the threat of radical Islamic terrorism pale in comparison to the grave threat posed by Russia.

This is yet another example of the disconnect between Beltway talking heads and the American people. Hard-working Americans — including constituents in my Kentucky district — care about jobs, paying the bills, putting food on the table, and leaving this country a better place for their children. The alleged “vast Russian conspiracy” harped upon by the Democrats and media since the election of President Trump is simply not a concern of normal Americans.

To date, “proof” of a Russian conspiracy to interfere in U.S. elections includes only Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s indictments of 13 Russian nationals and 12 Russian intelligence officers. The Russian nationals are accused of identity theft that allowed them to create fake social media accounts, and the 12 Russian intelligence officers are alleged to have hacked into the computers of the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s campaign prior to the 2016 election. Most importantly, all indictments fail to allege that a single U.S. vote was changed.

Unfortunately, what began as only Russophobic rhetoric seems to have turned into a witch hunt, as President Trump calls it.

For example, the current hysteria may have motivated the recent arrest and indictment of Maria Butina, a former Russian graduate student at American University in Washington, D.C. Unlike many accused of violent crimes, Butina (who has not been accused of harming anyone) was denied bail, and is now reportedly being held in solitary confinement in federal prison until her trial. The indictment claims she acted as an unregistered agent of the Russian government. Thin on substance, it oddly suggests, for example, that attendance at a National Prayer Breakfast is something nefarious.

My colleague Dana Rohrabacher and I met with the Russian delegation that attended the prayer breakfast last year. Congressman Rohrabacher, a former speechwriter for President Reagan during the Cold War, was once on the front lines with the mujahedeen when they fought the Soviets, yet even he now faces criticism for seeking better relations with Russia.

While our justice system has always upheld the presumption of “innocent until proven guilty,” the relentless negative press surrounding Butina’s arrest presumes her guilt. So far, the evidence mostly shows that she is simply a strong supporter of the right to bear arms, has advocated for this right in Russia, and genuinely hoped for improved Russia-U.S. relations. These are not crimes.

What if Russia decided to indict and imprison an American student in Russia based upon thin evidence and charges of acting as an “unregistered U.S. agent”? The Golden Rule applies to nations, not just individuals.

This is why the recent visit to Russia by my fellow Kentuckian Rand Paul is so courageous. In attempting to keep the lines of communication open between our two countries, he demonstrates true statesmanship amid a new xenophobic isolationism sweeping the anti-Trump media.

Sen. Paul’s meeting with Mikhail Gorbachev reminds me of President Reagan’s summits with that former leader of the Soviet Union. Like Paul and President Trump, Ronald Reagan believed in the power of a willingness to talk with our adversaries. Many believe that Reagan’s cordial relationship with Gorbachev encouraged the policies of “perestroika” and “glasnost” — an openness to freedom that led to communism’s downfall in Russia.

True leaders understand that dialogue is the quickest pathway to peace. As my colleague Rep. Rohrabacher says, “We need to find areas of cooperation and peace instead of constant belligerence that can only lead to war.” Contrary to what the D.C. elites would have you believe, Russia is not the biggest threat facing the United States today. The Russia scare is a distraction from our real threats, which include our massive national debt, porous borders, and an out-of-control federal government that claims the right to spy on Americans without a warrant.

It’s time to end the obsession with Russia. In the words of the famous English writer G.K. Chesterton, “A great nation ought not to be a hammer, but a magnet.” Let’s stop the bellicose rhetoric and instead start leading by example.

Thomas Massie is a Republican member of the House who has represented Kentucky’s 4th Congressional District since 2012.

If you are to believe the official story, one of America’s deadliest wars in history, Vietnam, was started after the United States had been attacked in the Gulf of Tonkin in the South China Sea. However, over the past 54 years, a deluge of information and government officials have come forward showing that most everything the government and the media told Americans about the Gulf of Tonkin was a lie.

Often, the American mainstream media becomes a de facto government employee, taking the claims of U.S. officials and reporting them as proven fact — and nothing exemplifies this penchant better than reporting on the Gulf of Tonkin incident — perhaps one of most flagrant lies ever dreamed up as a justification for war.

According to the widely discredited official story, on August 2, 1964, the destroyer USS Maddox, while performing a signals intelligence patrol as part of DESOTO operations, was pursued by three North Vietnamese Navy torpedo boats of the 135th Torpedo Squadron. The North Vietnamese torpedo boats then attacked with torpedoes and machine gun fire.

Two days later, according to the official story, on August 4, 1962, the NSA reported that a second Gulf of Tonkin incident occurred and US ships were attacked once again.

The next day, without question, on August 5, 1964, the New York Times reported “President Johnson has ordered retaliatory action against gunboats and ‘certain supporting facilities in North Vietnam’ after renewed attacks against American destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin.” Additional outlets, such as the Washington Post, echoed this claim.

The outcome of these two incidents was the passage by Congress of the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which granted then-President Lyndon B. Johnson the authority to assist any Southeast Asian country whose government was considered to be jeopardized by “communist aggression.” The resolution served as Johnson’s legal justification for deploying U.S. conventional forces and the commencement of open warfare against North Vietnam.

As a result, 58,177 Americans would lose their lives. Additionally, over one million North and South Vietnamese, including 627,000 civilians would be slaughtered.

But it wasn’t true. At all. In fact, the Gulf of Tonkin incident, as it became known, turned out to be a fictitious creation courtesy of the government to escalate war in Vietnam — leading to the deaths of tens of thousands of U.S. troops and millions of Vietnamese, fomenting the largest anti-war movement in American history, and tarnishing the reputation of a nation once considered at least somewhat noble in the eyes of the world.

The truth of the matter was that the Maddox was engaged in an aggressive intelligence gathering operation working hand in hand in coordinated attacks on North Vietnam by the South Vietnamese navy and the Laotian air force. When the government announced that it had been the victim of an unprovoked attack—this was a lie.

In the 2003 documentary The Fog of War, the former United States Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara admitted that the August 4 Gulf of Tonkin attack never happened. In 1995, McNamara met with former Vietnam People’s Army General Võ Nguyên Giáp to ask what happened on August 4, 1964 in the second Gulf of Tonkin Incident. “Absolutely nothing”, Giáp replied. Giáp claimed that the attack had been imaginary.

In 2010, more than 1,100 transcripts from the Vietnam era were released, proving Congress and officials raised serious doubts about the information fed to them by the Pentagon and White House. But while this internal grumbling took place, mainstream media dutifully reported official statements as if the veracity of the information couldn’t be disputed.

Tom Wells, author of the exhaustive exposé “The War Within: America’s Battle Over Vietnam,” explained the media egregiously erred in “almost exclusive reliance on U.S. government officials as sources of information” and “reluctance to question official pronouncements on ‘national security issues.’”

If due diligence had been performed, and reporters had raised appropriate doubts about the Gulf of Tonkin false flag, it’s arguable whether support for the contentious war would have lasted as long as it did and over a million lives would’ve been saved.

Now, retired military officials—who pay attention to history—are even warning about more staged events to pull us into war.

“I think the president needs to watch carefully for the potential for something like the Gulf of Tonkin incident,” Col. Macgregor said. “Many of your viewers may not remember that it never happened and we could very well be treated to something like that in the Gulf. We should watch for that, and this is an example of President Trump’s comments on fake news, he should not be sabotaged by fake news.”

Indeed, as TFTP has reported at length, nearly all wars in US history have been started over false information. To see a full list of our data, you can click this link.

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Matt Agorist is an honorably discharged veteran of the USMC and former intelligence operator directly tasked by the NSA. This prior experience gives him unique insight into the world of government corruption and the American police state. Agorist has been an independent journalist for over a decade and has been featured on mainstream networks around the world. Agorist is also the Editor at Large at the Free Thought Project. Follow @MattAgorist on Twitter, Steemit, and now on Facebook.

Much has been made about the Trump Administration’s hostility toward the media, and orders to keep troop levels classified in various war zones. The Pentagon’s lack of candor with the press is now also a growing problem, and is irking reporters who cover Pentagon briefings.

Which is to say, the reporters who are supposed to cover Pentagon briefings, but are mostly sitting around at this point. Defense Secretary James Mattis hasn’t briefed reporters on camera since April, and his spokesperson Dana White hasn’t either since May. There used to be plenty of chances to ask questions of Pentagon leadership: now it’s virtually impossible.

Earlier this month, Army Chief Gen. Mark Milley had a news conference at the Pentagon. Pentagon officers, however, warned reporters that he was only willing to talk about the specific location of a new command, Other questions were rejected by officials, with no answer given. Even a reporter commenting that they don’t get to see Gen. Milley enough to ask questions was quickly cut off.

Reporters at the Pentagon say that less and less information is being offered, and that when officials do talk, they’re only going to address subjects they want to talk about. Trying to keep the American public informed based on Pentagon statements is an exercise in futility.

Pentagon officials defended their lack of media access, saying they have an obligation to “get the facts right” and are only interested in working with journalists they feel “are equally committed to getting it right.” Former officials added that Mattis is concerned by making Trump angry with him. That means, according to those officials, he is erring on the side of “safety” by cutting out the press.